


The Wasting Game

by captainandersmith



Category: The Adventure Zone (Podcast)
Genre: Angst, Angst with a Happy Ending, Eating Disorders, Friendship, Gen, Hurt/Comfort
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-09-13
Updated: 2017-09-13
Packaged: 2018-12-27 15:30:08
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 11,512
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12083937
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/captainandersmith/pseuds/captainandersmith
Summary: A fic that explores Taako's issues with food from the event at Glamour Springs to the end of The Eleventh Hour arc.A story about Taako, the past that keeps following him, the friends he can't shake off, and his slow road to recovery.





	The Wasting Game

**Author's Note:**

> Hey so my first TAZ fic and it's basically venting. Projecting my own issues onto fictional characters is what I do best after all!  
> Includes events up until the end of The Eleventh Hour arc so no spoilers for anything past that. (And it explains why certain things are missing if you get what I'm saying)  
> This fic does deal with eating issues and although it's not particularly explicit, please be careful if you think this might affect you.  
> I wanted to explore how I think Taako might have been affected by what happened and his road to recovery.  
> Some dialogue and events come directly from the podcast.  
> The title and verse that is at the beginning of the fic come from the poem 'The Wasting Game' by Phillip Gross

_The eating thing:_

 

_the slouching beast_

_that's come to stay,_

 

_to spatter the slops_

_and foul the manger,_

 

_to snap at the hand_

_that tries to feed it, so_

 

_we leave it and we lie_

_in darkness, trying not to know,_

 

_not to hear it gnawing_

_in the next room, gnawing_

 

_itself to the bone._

_\----------_

When Taako was young, food meant happy memories. It meant his auntie hoisting him up onto the counter, letting him stir, lick the spoon. It meant giggling at their flour dusted noses and making funny shapes out of dough. She didn’t always have time for him but cooking was  _ their  _ time. Sweet and savoury he enjoyed every morsel, sneaking bits as they were cooking and taking pride in the finished product.

When his aunt died and he was living on the on the road, food still held some comfort for him. Though he didn't get to eat as well as he'd have liked and it became more of a necessity than a hobby, cooking made him happy. It was lonely travelling from group to group, but if he had even a makeshift stove and his aunt’s utensils he was content enough. Food meant a steady job, it meant something he could do better than anyone else he knew.

The performance side only occurred when he was travelling with a circus troupe years later. When the introductory acrobat had severe concussion and the other acts weren’t yet ready to go on, his boss shoved Taako on stage with some pans and a handful of ingredients. It was a ludicrous idea, and the audience ate it up. 

The cooking itself was average at best on that occasion. His jittery hands over-salted the fish and overcooked the vegetables. But every glance, every joke had the audience bubbling. They hung on the quirk of his eyebrow and gave him the biggest applause of the night. They were hooked and so was Taako. The adrenaline of being truly appreciated, of seeing others in awe at the things he could do, was a feeling like no other. The next day he packed his bags and moved on alone, the name ‘Sizzle it up with Taako’ already running through his head.

The first few shows were a hit and soon his act was in demand. He'd earned enough to afford a caravan of his own with a little kitchenette at the heart of it. But he wanted to go bigger. Sizzle it up with Taako wasn't just a cooking show, it was as much about the performance and the elf himself. He'd picked up some magic from people he'd worked with in the past, some mercenaries and adventurers, and others stage magicians, so though he was inexperienced, he learnt fast and had a wide range of tricks up his sleeve. With the addition of magic, the show was doing better than ever. 

He met Sazed after one of his shows. The man came up to him, broad shouldered and blushing, to tell him how much he admired Taako. After a few drinks in the local tavern and an exchange of stories, Taako had asked Sazed if he'd like a job as his lead (and only) crew member. Sure Taako was impulsive, but not usually with people. Arm's length was too close for his liking when it came to most folks. But he liked Sazed. He liked that he could and did have his back, how much he cared about the show, how he looked at Taako as if the very stars should be grateful to shine as bright. He trusted him. They were inseparable until Glamour Springs **.** Until the thirty clove garlic chicken.

That was the recipe that haunted him every day. Trying to remember what he'd transmuted into what, the order of the ingredients, what possibly could have gone wrong. Did he transmutate the elderberries into deadly nightshade? Did a shattered bowl end up in the chicken? 

It was probably the only time he hadn't tasted his own food before passing the samples round. One moment of absentmindedness had saved him from the gory death those forty audience members had suffered. Several more moments of absentmindedness had been the reason that they'd died in the first place.

When the first audience member began to cough up blood, Taako froze. He knew what was happening. It was the realisation of a deep seated fear that he never knew he’d harboured. When Sazed pulled him away, panic had descended with screaming amongst the coughing and groaning. The first row had already been wiped out.

With Sazed driving the stagecoach, they barely stopped for two days. Taako sat silently in the back. If Sazed said anything to him, he didn't hear it over the echoing wails of terror, the sobbing, the accusations. The voices of Glamour Springs clamoured in his head.

\----------

After combing through his memory of the event for the hundredth time, he was interrupted by a tapping foot in front of him. A foot connected to a stormy looking Sazed, with a bag in his hand.

“Don’t suppose you’ve got any rum in there, my dude?” Taako’s voice even sounded tinny to his own ears and Sazed wrinkled his nose and huffed out of disbelief.

“I’m leaving Taako”

“Cool, bring back something nice will ya”, he rolled over on the sofa with his back to the door, to Sazed.

“You know that’s not what I meant”

“You… you’re leaving me.”

“You killed those people. You fed them their deaths”

Memories are bullshit really. Because Taako had been facing the other way, but he remembers the exact look on Sazed’s face as he spat those words. He remembers that face that day better than the face of his dear aunt. 

There were a few moments when neither of them moved and everything shifted. “Well go on then if you're going. Let the fuckin’ door hit you on the way out, pretty sure that’s the saying”

\----------

He abandoned the conspicuous wagon a few days later, once he’d gathered the pieces of himself together, once he had a plan. He started walking. Going from town to town, eating enough to keep going and nothing that required the slightest bit of preparation from himself. He was going to do this until he found somewhere that no one recognised him, somewhere he could stop eating. Somewhere he could stop. No fuss, no drama. How very unlike Taako.

The tavern was intended to be one of his final destinations. If he was able to eat a decent meal then it would be his last. He could travel at least to the next town if not a few towns away, where he was sure no one would recognise him. And then… he'd just have to see what happened.

Only he couldn't eat. Well he  _ could  _ have eaten it if the food would allow itself to be eaten. But his hands were shaking, his nerves were frazzled and the food kept transmuting every time he went to take a bite. His milk turned to cola and the table to glass.

“Dammit” his voice cracked and eyes stung. Some people at the bar turned to look at him and he pulled his hat down further over his head. He’d cut his hair and lost a lot of weight but he still looked in the mirror and saw the disgraced chef. Is that what they all saw too? He brought his fork to the plate to try again and the table turned into beef.

“Dammit!” The food continued to change again and again before his eyes and he screwed them up tight. When he looked again, the food had stopped changing and settled.

_ Garlic chicken. _

“DAMMIT” he shrieked. This caught rather more attention than he wanted to and the argument that had been brewing a few tables over halted suddenly.

“Oh is that ...Taako? What the fuck?”, a burly looking man with laughably bushy sideburns had turned to him, seemingly baffled. 

So the jig was up. Well, shit.

“... Yes. Yes that's me.” Taako stood, pulled his robe around him and made for the door when a hand grabbed his arm in a grip that seemed gentle, but inescapable. His panic was immediately dispelled by the cheerful smile the man gave him.

“We used to love your show in the town I'm from”, he actually seemed eager and genuine. Jesus this guy was like a god damned puppy. What an annoyance.

“Um, where was it?”

“Raven's Roost”

“Ah yes Raven's Roost, the... best audiences in the world”, Taako tried to pull away but his captor had turned his attention back to the argument he'd been having and apparently his tiny human brain could only be aware of one creature at a time so he was still locked in his vice grip. The dwarf guy he was with was squaring up to an orc who looked like he could have thrown him into orbit and the dimwitted human who'd dragged him into this started to flush in outrage despite his quiet words.

For God's sake. He'd been trying to get through his meal and now he was caught up in some argument about a dumb job application or some shit. Well, fuck it then.

“Ok  _ FINE.  _ I'll go do an adventure thing with you guys because,  _ I can't eat _ . And I'm...  _ hungry _ . And I've got some place to be”

Dog-human-tank man gave him a look of surprise and excitement that almost made Taako want to take back his words already,“sounds like a deal!”

\----------

One (mostly) heroic endeavor later, Taako was examining the bracer now fastened to his arm when Magnus tapped his shoulder, “Don't you have some place to be?”

“Excuse me?”

“When we met, you said you had some place to be. Does that mean you're leaving now?”

He hadn’t expected Magnus to remember that, he hadn’t really expected any scenario where the three of them would be together any longer than this job. Magnus didn't know what the full implications of Taako’s ‘leaving' would probably be, but he looked apprehensive nonetheless.

“...I suppose I can stick around for a bit”

\----------

Taako should have known that he’d live to regret that. Things are more complicated on the moon. Aside from the obvious complications of being on a base he didn’t know existed, with a job he never thought he’d have, and hunting deadly objects that the general population was blissfully unaware of. Mealtimes were complicated. Taako had a purpose now, a way to make things right, the whole world could have suffered the same fate as Phandolin if it hadn’t been for him, Magnus and Merle. So why wasn’t his appetite back?

Most people seemed to accept this as one of Taako’s quirks: Taako transmutates the furniture, Taako is always late to training, and Taako doesn’t seem to eat much.

Everything would probably have been fine if Magnus and Merle would give him a few hours of goddamn peace. Apparently these chuckle-fucks seemed to think that adventuring and saving each other’s lives and yadda yadda meant that they should be practically walking round the base holding hands or something. And with them living in Taako’s pocket they start to pick up on his eating habits, or rather the lack of them. When they invited him to the cafeteria and he declined yet again (“ _ I got shit to do amigos, can’t be lounging around with you two” _ ), Magnus looked like someone said they’d snap his axe in front of him and Merle almost managed the expression of a worried parent.

Then one day Magnus was in the middle of telling a story, he was right at the part where he was surrounded by dire wolves with only small chiseling tools at his disposal when he stopped and announced that he was starving and they should get dinner while he finishes his story. Sneaky fucker. Eager to hear what came next, Taako ended up sat in the cafeteria with a plate of food that Merle placed wordlessly in front of him. He knew that although the boys’ intentions didn’t seem to be to force feed him, he couldn’t leave the plate full. 

_ Come on dipshit. It's just crappy sauteed vegetables. Nothing the great wizard Taako, reclaimer extraordinaire, can't handle. _

Trying to keep his mind on what Magnus was saying and stop his hand from trembling, bite by bite, Taako ate most of what was on his plate, feeling only a little nauseous afterwards. Though the other two didn't seem to be paying attention, a particularly observant onlooker would notice the way Merle's shoulders had relaxed and Magnus’ speech had become more animated.

There was still the odd day where Taako disappeared or made excuses, still the odd day his brain fed him lies about ‘self control’ and ‘what he deserved’, but for the most part, they built a routine. He somehow ended up in the cafeteria each night or after morning training with a plate in front of him, the fullness of which was less daunting each time.

So much less daunting in fact, that he began to empty his plate. Which was fine (he told himself) it was  _ fine _ . Until the day it wasn't fine. It occurred to him that he had emptied his plate twice in one meal. The numbers didn't add up and he panicked. He excused himself so quietly he wasn't sure the others had heard him and rushed outside, well, as  _ outside _ as you could get on a moonbase made of domes. Before he had time to breathe, his stomach was empty again and two hands pulled his hair away from his face while another rubbed a firm circle into his back.

“I'm sorry” he croaked, “I'm sorry, I-I-I didn't mean- I didn't mean to. I'm sor-sorry”

“It's alright buddy, healing takes time”

“We're right here with you Taako”

He had largely avoided Magnus and Merle for the next week, pity and concern were two expressions he could never stand and seemed all the more nauseating coming from them. He always made a point of showing up to dinner though, because it wasn’t a big deal.  _ It wasn’t _ . And if the other two noticed that Taako wasn’t eating as much or it took him a bit longer, they knew better than to ask.

Well, they didn’t always know better. But as soon as either of them got  _ that look _ in their eye or opened their mouths to ask how he was doing, Taako would give a challenging stare and pointedly stab another piece of meat, or launch into the latest plan to torture Leon. 

\----------

Magnus was whittling at his desk when Taako flounced into his room and threw himself onto the bed sighing, “Ughhh...”

Magnus didn’t turn to look at him but his shoulders twitched with an almost imperceptible chuckle.

Taako propped himself up on one elbow, “I said, UGHHH…” he emphasised this sigh by throwing his limbs out like a starfish, “It’s like you don’t even care about my problems Maggie!”

Still focussed on what looked to be a duck carving in his hands Magnus said, “What’s the matter Taako, with such a dramatic entrance it must a matter of life and death hm?”

“Oh  _ hardly _ Magnus, I just need to think of a dumb gift to get my lousy acquaintances for stupid candlenights and I figured you were good at this sappy shit and would help me out”

At this Magnus turned to face him, quite clearly attempting to stifle a grin, “You’re getting gifts? Who for? This doesn’t seem very Taako!”

“Hmm… I guess you two losers and then the Director, Killian and Carey, Johann, Angus…” He shot down Magnus’ excited clapping with a pointed stare, “Look, I had no choice okay! There’s been word around the base about people preparing presents and here you are carving… whatever that is! And yeah useless holiday traditions might not be part of the Taako brand, but neither is being outshined and shown up!”  

“So… you want help deciding what to get everyone?”

“ _ Gods _ Magnus, could you  _ be _ any slower on the uptake my dude? Yes, I need something impersonal but with enough effort to be an acceptable present, like your little wooden monstrosities”

Magnus opened his mouth to speak a few times before finally speaking, his expression, for once, totally blank. “Well uh, you could maybe try… cooking something? Y’know like biscuits or cakes?” Each word was placed like a weighty pebble and when he finished, Magnus began to chew the inside of his lip.

Taako lay back on the bed and with a flick of his wrist levitated himself effortlessly, staring at the ceiling with his arms folded across his chest, “Hmm”

“That is, if you want to, if you can, y’know? Uh, it’s just, you mentioned that you used to cook a lot and uh… everyone likes treats!” there was a comical panic to Magnus’ tone now and Taako almost felt like leaving him hanging for a bit longer. Almost.

“Maggie, of course I can cook.  I’ll bake the best damn goodies this base has ever seen, my man!”

\-----------

Baking the macarons hadn’t been much of a problem. Well that was a bit of a lie. But Taako could cope with a slight panic attack or two. He could cope with having to make multiple batches because his shaky hands fucked up the recipe or “accidentally” threw the finished ones away. He could cope with the constant queasiness and the just wrong, wrong,  **wrong** of the situation.

What he couldn’t cope with was the finished product. The plate of perfect, certainly delicious macarons that taunted him from the table. He  _ knew  _ that they were perfectly safe. And then he was 90% sure. And then he began to question every move he’d made. There had been no magic, no showboating and yet somehow he still wasn’t sure. He couldn’t give these to everyone.

Magnus and Merle must have noticed the sudden lack of clattering and cursing as they began to emerge from their rooms, each going to stand either side of Taako as he glared at the plate of food as if it were a bomb to disarm. 

Merle cleared his throat, “Uhh… those look great Taako”

“Yup”, god he sounded pathetic even to himself. No wonder the boys were acting as if he would break if they moved an inch, “Just need to check them”

When he didn’t make a move towards the dessert in question, he could feel the glance that Merle and Magnus shared behind him.

Magnus moved to sit in an adjacent chair and Merle automatically copied this action, “Hey Taako? Let’s try them together bud”

“Uh yeah, what Magnus said! After all, it’s only right that the Tres Horny Boys should be the first to get at these bad boys!”

It wasn’t the smoothest approach they could have taken, and Taako signalled that fact with a raised eyebrow. Although, considering that this was Merle and Magnus, this was probably a critical success for tactfulness. 

“Look, Taako…” Magnus’ rare serious tone drew Taako’s gaze away from the macarons momentarily, “ You trust us, don’t you?”

“Depends” Taako replied breezily, but from Magnus and Merle’s wry smiles he could tell they knew what his sincere answer would be.

_ Yes. Always. _

“Then we are gonna try these bomb-ass macarons together”

Taako knew from the first bite of his own that he’d done it. He’d made not only edible, but fucking  _ delicious  _ macarons. That didn’t stop him panicking about Merle and Magnus, searching for symptoms even as they made ecstatic noises of appreciation and licked every crumb off their fingers. But if he walked past their doorways and peered in one too many times that evening, neither of them commented on it.

\----------

It should have been easy after that, to hand out his baking as candlenights presents. But when Johann paused before smiling at the taste, or Killian’s eyes widened before she begged Taako to teach her how to make them too, his heart would stop beating. Halfway through the rounds, his hands were cold and clammy and he felt a migraine coming on. But he did feel a small sense of accomplishment at every astounded recipient.

But why was ‘the world’s greatest annoyance’ holding him up? He would suddenly rather incinerate every last macaron than let Angus take a single bite. He was glad at least that Angus hadn’t eaten them in front of him.

\----------

Taako had expected the soppy ‘feelings’ to go away once he was back in his right mind, but a few months later he’d somehow offered to teach boy wonder some magic. Surely it wasn’t because he wanted him to be able to protect himself? Surely it wasn’t because he  _ cared  _ about the little weasel? Of course not. He was just concerned with keeping his own magic muscles limber. And if it meant that the boy was a little less useless, then that was an added bonus.

“Hey Taako, can I ask you a question?” 

Taako was almost certain that he would regret this, “Yeah sure, shoot”

Angus looked delighted and nervous at the same time, “Who taught you how to do magic?”

Oh boy. A trip down memory lane it was then, “Uhhh that… that's a long story, I didn't so much learn, I-I uh used to be a chef, a long time ago-”

“That's right! You made me those macaroons and they tasted so good I ate them as a candle nights treat by myself, by myself, in my room. I just cuddled up next to the candle nights bush and there weren't so many presents under mine but that's ok and I ate the macarons and it was the highlight of my holiday”

Taako was taken aback by the tirade of appreciation from Angus. Sure his cooking was phenomenal, but the idea that it would mean so much to someone felt… strange. (The thought of the young boy so alone on a moon base full of people stirred something else within Taako but he pushed that deep,  _ deep  _ down.)

“I tried to learn um… I was a chef and I thought learning transmutation magic would help, uhhh, you know… spice things up a bit, right?” He couldn’t believe he was confessing all this to the world’s most annoying baby before he’d even told Merle and Magnus, but with each word that dropped off his tongue he felt a sliver of catharsis so he continued, “Nobody's impressed if you put mustard on a hotdog because you had the mustard. But what if you went into a box with just mustard and a hotdog and came out with chicken cordon blue? People would be really impressed by that right?”

“That would be amazing sir!”

He gave a humourless laugh,“So yeah, I tried to do that and I wasn't really that… competent at first. And, then I sorta lost control and I was transmogrifying things without really thinking about it, which was a bad scene”

“So why don't you cook very much any more, sir? The macarons you made were so delicious and I wonder why you don't cook for your friends more often, sir?” The kid looked so darn earnest and it sent a chill up Taako’s spine. How was he supposed to explain what he did to Angus? Especially since this kid, for some unknown reason, looked at him like he hung the moon.

He sighed, “Well, Angus… ummmm. One time I transmogrified something that uhh… I transmogrified it into something you really shouldn't eat. Ever. For life- to live I mean. And uh, a lot of people ate that. And that went ... _ so sideways _ , and um I just decided that, I would never again cook for people I cared about. Because I couldn't risk, you know, something happening to them until I get  _ this _ under control I guess”

_ “This” _ , he thought wryly to himself,  _ what is “this”? His weakness? His penance? _

Angus took a step closer, he didn’t look disappointed or repulsed but rather… concerned.“That's very sad sir. I'm sorry for making you bring that up, I can tell that upset you.”

Angus must be a pretty good detective since Taako himself couldn’t tell how upset he was, he was mainly trying not to think about it, “Yeaaaaah that's okay, I uhhh just don't cook for anybody who's close to me, that I care about… if they live or die specifically.”

Angus’ face melted into a crestfallen frown, “You did let  _ me  _ eat the macaroon”

Despite not caring about this kid (because he  _ definitely  _ didn’t, okay?), the physical sensation following those words was something akin to a knife to the gut, “I did, I did. In hindsight, that was a lapse of judgment. I was just really excited about making macarons and I'm fairly certain that they weren't poisoned, I didn't goof that one up. You're here right? You're fine? Have you always been this height?” 

Taako winced at the unbidden cascade of words but luckily Angus took the signal to take the nearest exit off Serious Highway, “I  _ have  _ shrunk like 4 inches in the past couple months…”, he shifted closer to Taako and softly elbowed him in the side as he said this.

“...Not related”

\----------

If you asked Taako a couple of weeks later how Angus was getting along he’d probably say something like, “Meh, the boy’s not a complete failure” but the truth was that he learnt fast. He should have expected as much from the little know-it-all. By now Angus was able to cast a pretty competent ‘produce flame’ as well as a handful of other basic spells.

“Sir! Sir! Check it out!” he looked delighted but almost shy as he held out the flame to his mentor for approval and Taako, for once, didn’t have the heart to shoot him down.

“That is awesome. Congratulations Agnes!”, Taako ruffled Angus’s hair a little and then pretended to wipe his hand clean on his skirt

“Thank you sir… did you say Agnes?” Despite the confusion at the new nickname, he looked all too pleased with himself and Taako decided to remedy that with a chilling dramatic monologue about challenging his power. He felt a little bad when Angus’s bottom lip started to wobble. Only a little mind you.

Despite this little bit of friendly bullying, at the end of the lesson, Angus presented Taako with a small cardboard box of macarons, “I-I made these for you sir, to thank you for the magic lessons!”

It was a nice surprise to Taako himself that he was actually excited about this gift, “Oh hell yeah! Thank you so much Agnes, I am going to enjoy these… in my bunk” although he was back to a normal eating schedule, snacks were often hard to stomach this early in the morning… and he couldn’t guarantee the quality of Angus’s baking.

“Aren't you going to eat one right now sir?”

Angus looked a little crestfallen and Taako could have sworn he’d been taking lessons in puppy-dog-eyes from Magnus. Or maybe the other way round. “Yeah sure I'll eat one right now what the hell”

He took a bite and well, it could have been worse. It also could have been much better. The macaron was completely flavourless.

“It's fine. It's just fine”

Angus winced but luckily didn’t seem offended, “I know I probably goofed up on the flavour profile a little bit…”

“You know what? You got the texture just right and really with a macaroon that's the hard part. And really any sugar at all would be great”, damn it was a struggle to be positive about these terrible baked goods. Taako didn’t even know why he was bothering, he’d certainly never been conscientious about sparing Angus’s feelings before.

“Dang that was it” Angus shuffled uncomfortably, looking almost guilty, “I was wondering if you could maybe use prestidigitation to maybe get some flavour on these bad boys?”

Magic was no problem for Taako, and food he could… deal with. But the two together? “I- uh- you  _ could  _ but… you shouldn't cross those streams little man that got me into some bad trouble and I wouldn't recommend it”

Angus looked down and began picking at the lid on the macaron box before setting it on the table, “I was just hoping that maybe you could just show me how prestidigitation works. But I understand if _ …  _ no I understand”

Taako was used to people being disappointed in him. Sometimes he thrived on the fact. This little twerp just seemed to be the exception to all his rules recently. He steeled himself and tried to think as little as he could about what he was about to do, “No it's fine. Yeah prestidigitation. Here you go. I'll just sorta make these taste better” 

So he casts prestidigitation. Except he doesn’t. The staff shoots a scorching ray at the box of macarons and Angus jumps out of the way just in time, fortunately more confused than terrified.

“Well okay, I can understand if you didn't like them sir but that's all you had to say, you didn't have to burn em all up”

Taako’s chest is heaving with the effort of steadying his breath, “Wha- that's not what I cast…”

Before he can attempt to explain something that he doesn’t truly understand himself, the staff begins firing again, ray after ray in a pattern in the wall, eventually spelling the letters L, U and P on the wall. The recoil of repeated firing pushes Taako to the floor.

“W-What's that? What is Lup?” 

Angus seems inexplicably delighted by this turn of events “Sir I appreciate the magic lessons, it seems like you've given me an even better gift, a new mystery to solve!

But Taako has already forgotten about the letters. He’s now thinking of the pile of ash that sits only feet away from Angus McDonald. There’s only been one reason his magic has malfunctioned this badly in the past. He’d almost hurt Angus because he couldn’t control his emotions where  _ this  _ was concerned. This couldn’t happen again.

“Ango? I, uh, I think this’ll be it for our lessons for… a while”

Angus didn’t look up from his notebook that he was vigorously scribbling in, “What? Why can’t we keep doing magic?”

_ Why? Ha. Yeah why don’t you tell him the reason Taako? Because you’re illogical? Weak? Broken? _

Only when he felt small hands prying his own from his eyes did he realise that he was still on the floor and had been for a while. 

“Taako?” the little round face in front of him wrinkled with worry and Angus’s appeal was fractured by a crack in his voice.

“I- shit I- I fucked up Ango, I thought I could handle this, but I- well I almost… and you almost… I’m not putting you in danger again”

The hands holding his own were shaking slightly until they tightened, grounding them both. Looking properly now at the boy kneeling in front of him, Taako watched the world’s greatest detective piece together what he’d never been able to voice out loud to anyone. With effort, Angus morphed his expression into the sternest one he could manage, “Taako sir, I know that running is kind of your forte but, you can’t run… from yourself. So you’re gonna have to try my method of dealing with problems, look for some solutions. Or at least some work-arounds”

Taako withdrew his hands to wipe at any possible mascara stains under his eyes, “Don’t worry about me sweetpea, I’m fine”

“No you’re not. But you will be, right?”

Taako smiled and put a hand to Angus’s cheek in lieu of answering but nodded when his hopeful expression faltered.

“Do you promise sir?”

“Yeah. I promise pumpkin”

\----------

It’s this promise that echoes in his head days later when he sees the ‘No-sodium Salt Shaker’ on the shelf in the Fantasy Costco. An item that will reveal poison when shaken over food. “Look for solutions and work-arounds, don’t run” Taako muttered under his breath as he turned the object over in his hand.

The other boys were confused by Taako’s choice seeing as Merle could heal most poison infections anyway and they weren’t exactly in the habit of accepting food from strangers. Plus they still seemed to think that together they would be able to save up for that dumb sword. Yeah, like they’d  _ ever  _ get their hands on  _ that _ .

But since Merle and Magnus could see how excited Taako was pretending not to be about this object they didn’t question it further. He was even in a good enough mood to cook for them that evening, something he hadn’t done since the candlenights macarons. It was only on the third night that Merle caught him using the No-sodium Salt Shaker that they realised that something wasn’t right.

Taako could tell that he was in for a talking to by the darting glances Merle kept giving him over the table, “So, Taako, why uh… why do you keep checking our food for poison?”

“Mmf… wha-?” Magnus grunted through a mouthful of pasta.

“Magnus darling, don’t talk with your mouth full it only makes you look more like a neanderthal” Taako quipped, glazing right over Merle’s question.

“Taako, please”, Merle was well acquainted with, and annoyed by, Taako’s talent for circumventing the conversation. Before he continued he leaned in and lowered his voice despite them being the only three in their living space, “Is this… is this why you sometimes… have trouble eating? Are you worried that someone’s trying to poison you?”

Magnus’s jaw dropped comically, spaghetti spilling out onto the plate as he began to splutter in a way that was equal parts concerned and unintelligible. 

“Alright, hold your fantasy horses you two. No one’s trying to poison me. I would hope that someone trying to get rid of the great wizard Taako would go for something a little more original than poison” Neither of them looked particularly reassured by this.

Taako sighed, he knew he would have to explain himself at some point, he  _ wanted  _ to, especially now that he was pretty sure they wouldn’t think any less of him. Each of them had their fair share of mistakes and baggage so this was about par for the course for the Tres Horny Boys. But pouring your heart out, even metaphorically, was usually a pretty gruesome affair and so he’d been putting it off.

“Alright then boys. I guess it’s story time. Heads up though… this one’s a bit of a bummer”

\----------

All things considered, things had been alright in Taako’s life since then. Telling Angus and the boys about his past did mean a few more worried looks on days he couldn’t handle the thought of dinner but at least he no longer had to worry about some huge confrontation.

Nevertheless, when The Chalice told him that she would give him the opportunity to change his worst mistake, there was no doubt in his mind what she was referring to. The single biggest regret of his life, the consequences of which stuck with him each and every day. In every mouthful he couldn’t stomach, in every day that getting out of bed felt like more than he deserved, in every friend that reminded him of the one he’d lost. Until Merle and Magnus, Sazed was the only person that cared about him since his Aunt. On that day he’d lost everything, and caused unimaginable loss in return.

Still, he knew what his answer would be. Since joining the bureau, he was sure he’d saved more than forty people, a fact that helped him rest a little easier at night. If he took the offer, chances are those people would be dead. He tried to focus on the numbers.

So, as ‘The Chalice’ started to rewind through his life, Taako rolled his eyes, “Listen, my dude. I know this is kinda your schtick, but you don't have to bother with all this dramatic flashback stuff. I know what you're going to show me so uhh… we can just skip to the whole decision making bit”

He almost thought he saw a tinge of sympathy in her eyes as she shook her head, “It's part of the deal remember, you must listen to what I have to say or I won’t let June go”

Taako shrugged and folded his arms (would a relic inhabiting a human body be able to tell that his hands were beginning to shake?). As expected, the memory she lingers on is the final episode of ‘Sizzle It Up With Taako’. He sees his younger, smiling self in front of the audience. He sees Sazed standing to the side picking at his nails. He sees the plate of garlic chicken making its way around the crowd.

Like clockwork, the sequence he’s re-lived almost every night for the past few years begins. The plate is emptied, he conjures the ingredients for his next dish, a cough worms it's way through the applause. 

After that things move too quickly to be ordered. It's a mess of noise and colour and bodies. This is nothing new. He watches himself run and it's nothing new.

The scene shifts. Something new. A young human girl sitting up in a bed, her skin an unnatural pale green hue and her hands clenched around the rim of a bucket as she chokes out copious amounts of liquid. She looks up at the family members surrounding the bed and it drips down her chin. Blood. She pauses only for a moment before guttural retching echoes in Taako’s ears again. A second scene: a dwarf boy struggling to help an elderly woman into a chair, his arms convulsing trying to support the weight of this adult. A third scene: A doctor trying hopelessly to resuscitate a half-elf man who looked like he should be in the prime of his life.

Each scene she shows Taako is different in it’s own grisly way, but they are linked by a common factor. They came to see the cooking show, they got sick and died, they would be alive if it weren’t for Taako.

“Al-alright, alright. I get the idea you can stop now” Taako said, voice coming out a lot quieter than he’d intended. But she didn’t stop, only turned to look Taako in the eye as she flashed through every victim and the specific gruesome way they had met their end.

He couldn’t tear his eyes away, could scarcely blink, each scene struck him to his very core, but he felt that he needed to watch. He deserved to see the damage he had caused. He only realised that the the visions had stopped when the sound of his own shuddering breaths filled the space the chalice had taken him to.

She seemed unfazed by Taako’s state, sparing him only a sideways glance as she led Taako into a smaller wagon that was intimately familiar to him, “I have one last important thing to show you” she said, almost sounding sad..

And there was something else new. Something deeply ingrained in his past, happening only moments away from his past self and yet entirely new. It was a difficult picture to come to terms with, mostly because the two main elements didn’t match. The first was Sazed, Taako’s first and (until recently) only friend. The one person he had allowed himself to trust unconditionally. The second was a simple bottle of arsenic. He knew immediately what this bottle must mean, what had really happened. And yet, he found it difficult to understand. No actually, it wasn’t difficult to understand. That the man holding the poison was the poisoner. But goddamn if it wasn’t a painful conclusion.

“I guess this must come as some small relief right?” Taako had forgotten about the presence of The Chalice and even her soft reassurance was enough to make him start, quickly steeling his expression as he turned to look at her, “All this time you thought your transmutation, your… reckless magic was what killed the town of Glamour Springs. But in actuality? It was plain ol’ jealousy”

_ This bitch doesn’t have a clue what she’s talking about _ , thought Taako,  _ I abso-fuckin-lutely don’t feel any relief and nothing about this feels ‘plain’ or ‘simple’. _

“But still”, she continued, face hardening as if she could read Taako’s mind, “all those people died. The people of this town died all the same and you fed them their deaths”

Unbidden, another memory of Sazed occurs to Taako. The argument over Sazed wanting to be a co host of the show. The single dark moment, of an otherwise perfect companionship. His brain now helpfully supplied him with all of the subsequent warning signs that he had tried desperately to ignore. Sazed had stopped trying to argue against Taako’s refusal to give him more of the spotlight, but he certainly hadn’t accepted it. Now, years later, Taako wasn’t even sure why he’d done it. Was it selfishness? Not wanting to give up something that was finally, totally Taako? Fear that Sazed would be too much of a hit with the audience and move on to bigger better things? Probably all of the above. Whatever the reasoning, he had rejected the idea and made Sazed hate him so much that he was willing to ruin Taako’s career, willing to-

A dreadful thought suddenly clicked into place. All these years Taako had blamed himself for not tasting the food like he had done on every god forsaken show except that one. Sazed would have known that fact too. He didn’t only try to ruin Taako.

_ He tried to kill him _ .

With this realisation, he was back in the white space, stood in front of the woman, “This was the worst thing that ever happened Taako. In your life. And you can fix it. If you claim me, none of this ever happened. Glamour Springs lives and you can keep doing your cooking show and you won't have this horrible black mark on what is otherwise a heroic legacy. Take me Taako, take the cup and you can fix it all” she looked directly at Taako and her eyes were incisive but solemn, “You can fix yourself”

\----------

Stood there listening to his friends turn down the offer, Taako wondered how he was suddenly so close to changing his mind. He had been confident that he’d accepted himself now, his stupid mistakes and his… continuing weakness. But the chalice had showed him something that hit far harder than his preconceived notions of what happened.

Those people died because Taako was self-serving, egotistical, and entirely driven by greed. So much so that his only friend in the world had wanted him dead. If he didn’t have Magnus and Merle to think about, he would have found it difficult to resist this alluring offer. Luckily his friends were strong enough to refuse, because he sure as hell wasn’t. 

“It’s what I want, but it’s not what Julia would want”, stupid, brilliant, predictable Magnus.

“Eh, I’m not a big one for regrets”, deceptively thoughtful Merle. Hiding his own struggles with humour to protect everyone else.

Taako knew that he couldn’t explain everything to them, not here, or he’d probably reconsider his decision. He’d just have to do the thing he had always been best at. Lie through his fucking teeth.

“I mean here’s the thing for me, here’s where I’m at, the vision revealed to me was chill as hell, here’s how it shook out for Taako, and we can get into this a bit more if you guys want. But as it turns out, remember the thing that I’ve spent so long feeling kind of bad about, not super bad but pretty darn bad... not my fault! I have nothing to change, I didn’t do anything wrong! ...I’m in the best possible timeline for Taako”

Each word was bitter and wrong and false, but the small, genuine smile from Magnus and Merle’s pat on the shoulder (although a little too soft to be congratulatory) told him he’d said the right thing for now.

The chalice seemed unhappy with their responses and showed them the burning wreck of Phandolin and the thousands of lives lost in a last ditch attempt to get them to use the relic. But somehow it was far less tempting to change this timeline than his own. Even as they watched houses burn, people run, and the fear in Noelle’s eyes; Taako was certain that overall they had done the best they could. And maybe it was selfish, to care more about his own problems than the countless people that died in Phandolin. But selfishness was just par for the course where Taako was concerned, right?

\----------

Almost everyone in the Bureau could tell that all was not well with the Tres Horny Boys. The first week after they’d come back from their latest mission had been eerily quiet, but the silence was broken when Taako stormed out of their quarters one morning and apparently didn’t return until the early hours of the next. After that it was common to see one of the boys charging out in a rage or pensively wandering alone (although actually Taako was rarely seen at all). They didn’t attribute it to Taako’s absence but it was difficult to miss Magnus and Merle’s appearances in the cafeteria, each day looking to be a stronger combination of dejected and irate. 

Taako, at the eye of the storm, was having a comparatively calm experience. After the first argument with Merle and Magnus, he refused to engage in any further conversation about what happened with the chalice and his sudden lack of eating. When interrogated, he replied with only noncommittal noises and gestures, which only served to antagonise them. When pleaded with, he simply shut himself in his room, easily ignoring the apologies and entreaties from the other side of his door. The rare conversations he engaged in quickly devolved into screaming matches.

He just didn’t have the energy to explain, and he was tired of their sickening worry. He was tired of the whole base avoiding him like a plague victim on the rare occasions that he would leave his room. He was tired of sneaking out at night to get food he no longer felt entitled to, only to spend the next few hours craving the satisfaction that only hunger pangs could give him. He was just tired.

Much as he had tried to convince himself that what the chalice had showed him was good, it really didn’t feel that way. Whenever he looked in the mirror, the Taako he saw was physically more like the one in the chalice’s vision than the one that arrived on the moonbase. Softer, more rounded, selfish, a murderer.

\----------

The day that Johann came to fetch him for the Director, Taako had assumed that it was about the mirror that he’d broken. He wasn’t sure how the Director would have known about that but he’d had many letters from H.R. in the past about ‘destruction of bureau property’ and he was probably on a final warning.

“So… Johann, what’s with the mysterious meeting, homie?” Taako broached as casually as he could.

Johann didn’t seem fooled by the casual tone, word must have gotten around about his recent behaviour, “I’d say she’s probably about to have  _ the talk _ with you” 

“What? Like the birds and the bees? You do realise that I’m covered on that one. In fact, I’ve always done  _ pretty good  _ on that front”

Pausing before activating the lift with his bracer, Johann turned to give Taako a quick grimace, “Gross. No, not that kind of talk. I’ll leave the explaining to her”

Boy, the kid was about as amenable as usual, “Well then, if you insist on being obscure, how do you know it's the talk you’re thinking of?”

They ascended in silence for so long that Taako had assumed that his question had been ignored when eventually Johann looked up from where he’d been picking at his fingernails.

“I’ve had it enough times myself to know what the director looks like when she has to do it” he turned to make rare eye contact with Taako in a way that was almost chilling, “And what the recipient looks like”

Taako wasn’t blind. He had some idea of the kind of state Johann must have been in when he arrived at the moon base. He saw the intimate way the medic staff greeted him in the halls, talking about how much better he looked. The cafeteria staff would comment about how nice it was to see him smile and give him a double helping of crumble. And on days he seemed gloomier than usual, you’d be hard pushed to find him without a fiercely protective Avi by his side, as if he feared that he may disappear at any moment. To equate his own situation with Johann’s, someone who appeared to have been brought back from the brink, almost seemed illogical. When he considered that that’s how the bureau might view him, an individual bent on self destruction, it was like his own little brand of voidfish static coursed through his mind. Some might call it denial.

Standing in front of the Director’s office, Johann turned to him one last time to offer a weak, joyless smile, “Taako? Try to remember that honesty is the best policy. And please, if you can, make this the last time she has to say this to you. She’s hates doing it” his voice trailed off into a mutter and he nodded before stalking down the corridor.

Taako briefly considered just walking away but he’d begun to piece together the nature of this imminent conversation and decided that disappearing would only make matters worse. So he took a breath, and breezed through the door.

“How's it going Lucy? Long time, no see” the Director's back was turned as he flopped into the chair, pulling his hat forward a little to guard his expression.

With her back turned it was easy to see the Director's shoulders slump for a moment until she straightened herself up into a more official looking stance.

“Yes well, that's what I wanted to talk to you about, Taako” and the moment Lucretia turned to make eye contact with Taako, he got the feeling that she wouldn't be as easy to shrug off or shout down as his companions.

“There’s no easy way to say this Taako, but we’re worried about you. Since the last mission you’ve shut yourself away, no one has seen you eat, and you haven’t turned up to a single training session. You’ve only left your room to go on minor reclaiming missions”

Taako winced slightly, saying everything in succession like that made it sound much worse, “I’ve just been a little tuckered out is all, taking some Taako Time homie! I'm… I'm fine”

Evidently this answer was deeply unsatisfactory. A flare of pained anger disrupted the usually calm grey eyes, “Oh you’re fine? Perhaps you can explain a few little  _ discrepancies _ for me then. Explain why I’ve had to replace all the training dummies since Magnus is going through them like paper towels. Explain why Merle is spending more and more time off base, just to take a break from the endless arguments you three seem to have. Better yet, explain why I’ve had Angus McDonald in my office several times this week, crying about how you haven’t shown up to magic lessons in weeks and you wouldn’t even come out of your room to explain. He spent several whole days waiting in the cafeteria to see if you were eating or not. Avi had to carry him back to his room, if you care”

Taako knew the last bit was tacked on on for emphasis, a goading strike. Lucretia knew how he felt about the kid and was trying to use that to get him to explain.He picked at his nails to feign boredom, “Alright, I’ll show up to dinner and training and magic lessons and all that jazz, can I go now? I gotta… practice wizard stuff or some shit”

Lucretia was gifted with an unfaltering stare, one that made her seem twice as tall and made Taako feel twice as small. “Taako. The process you must undergo to retrieve the next grand relic will push you to your absolute limits. You will face fears you never knew you had and lose things you've always taken for granted. To even live through it… you need to want to”

Taako recognised that this sounded serious, but he just didn't  _ feel  _ it. He wasn't sure what would scare him now, or what he had left to lose. All the talk of fire and brimstone was just that. Talk. Something he was a bit sick of by now.

“Don’t worry Lucretia the THBs have got it, we’re 100% on the relic retrieving right now, we'll get it back safe and sound”

She sighed heavily before he'd even finished speaking, “ _ No _ Taako, that’s not what I’m talking about. I need you boys to come back. All three of you. This is not about the relics. Everyone cares about you. It feels like you’re slipping away from us. I’m worried that if I sent you there tomorrow… you wouldn’t even try to come back. You look  _ sick _ , Taako. And Merle and Magnus are worried  _ sick.  _ And I am  _ SICK  _ of watching you  _ destroy yourself”  _

Her fists were clenched and trembling against the table, she had maintained eye contact but he swore he could see her blink away tears of frustration. It was the angriest he'd ever seen the Director, and yet it felt more like she was pleading. It was chilling really. 

Taako looked down to smooth his skirt out, tracing the patterns and trying not to think about the implications of her words. How was he supposed to answer that? He didn't feel like he was trying to destroy himself. He didn't feel like he was doing anything, that was kind of what he was going for. He was tired and the mere thought of another mealtime or argument or fruitless training session was draining. It was nothing more than that.

Lucretia sat down in her chair and attempted to peer under Taako’s hat to make eye contact, “Taako I don’t know what the chalice offered you, or how that's making you feel… but it could be worse, you could be doing this alone”. Her tone was far softer now, the most sickening approach of all. He didn't need pity and he didn't deserve it. 

“Yeah, uh it's whatever, I'm not… this isn't…” the last thing he wanted to do was think about what the chalice had shown him. To consider that it might be the reason that he was…

“Look, I understand that you might not feel comfortable telling...  _ me _ about something so personal, but you should talk to Merle and Magnus. I-I need you to pull through”. Just like that, Lucretia closed off again. She leant back and folded her hands on her lap, swallowing any further emotion that threatened to spill over. It was as if Taako had upset her in some way, despite declining to say anything meaningful at all.

He nodded quickly, with an element of unintended sincerity. He wasn't eager to have another conversation like this, and from what Johann said, the Director didn't want that either.

“Good, I'll see you tomorrow Taako”

He stood and backed out of the office steadily, giving a lazy mock salute as he went.

“See ya later, gator”

\----------

On his return to the THB's shared quarters, Taako was confronted with the image of Magnus, Merle and Angus sat on the couch in a position that was neat and unnatural. 

If Magnus’s fidgeting and the fact that Angus looked to be on the verge of tears hadn't tipped him off, Merle's cautious approach was a sign that something was up. 

He stood up and cleared his throat, hands shoved in his pockets in feigned nonchalance. “Oh, Taako! We uh, we were just about to head to the cafeteria, do you want to come with?”

He should have known. He comes back from what was essentially an intervention with Lucretia to a welcome committee in his living room? It's a set up. He had been genuinely planning to start sorting himself out, perhaps even going to dinner tonight, but having the decision made  _ for  _ him didn't sit well in his stomach. He no longer had an appetite.

“Well… hm… see I was just about to uh, get some shut eye, ya feel? Maybe tomorrow though” 

He'd turned his back as he was talking to hang his cloak up and by the time he turned back, Magnus was leading Angus out of the room and Merle was standing with his arms folded and a face like thunder.

“Huh… was it something I said?” Taako grinned at Merle, hoping it might persuade him to  _ leave it,  _ just for tonight. No such luck.

“You don’t get to do that Taako” said Merle, his low and quiet tone draining any mirth from Taako’s features, “You don’t get to pretend that everything’s fine anymore, it’s not fair”

Part of Taako knew that Merle was right. And it was so tiring to keep the truth from everyone day after day. But at that moment, it felt like it would be more tiring to pour everything out. He felt so empty already, what could be left to give? 

“Everything  _ is  _ fine. Time heals all wounds and all that”

Merle advanced and reached up to prod Taako in the chest with a not insignificant amount of force “Bullshit. You’re falling apart and everyone on the base knows it. You’ve got people that care about you now and you’re not allowed to disappear”

Though Merle's tone was a little different, the message was familiar, “Oh I see you’ve been taking some guilt tripping tips from Lucretia have you? Let me guess, you and Magnus are taking it  _ really hard  _ and I’ve made snot-nosed wonder boy cry” Taako spat, trying to ignore the twisting in his stomach his own words initiated.

“You fucking prick. That boy worships you. You know what two questions he asked me today? He asked me… if you were dying. And then he asked if you  _ hated _ him”

Merle’s eyebrows had begun to twitch furiously. Merle liked to pretend that Angus was like an annoying scab to him, but even Angus knew where he really stood on the matter. So for Merle (who frequently insulted the boy and pushed him away) to tell Taako that  _ he’d _ done something to portray genuine hatred to Angus was inscrutable.

Seeing Taako’s unconcealed dismay, Merle adopted an easier tone, “We’re your friends and we are going to get to the bottom of this. We’ve tried to give you space but you’re just getting worse and worse. Magnus and I helped you get through this before and dammit we’re gonna do it again”

His determination was almost enough to convince Taako that that would be the case. Almost. But now that he’d relapsed, it was hard to see an end to all this. He felt doomed to oscillate between feeling awful and moderately okay for the rest of time. He was well aware that this was a toxic frame of mind but to him it seemed to be the truth.

Merle continued talking through Taako’s contemplative silence, attempting to interpret what it was that his friend was trying not to say, “If you’re trying to drive him away, or Magnus and I for that matter, because you don’t want us prying into your business-”

“Don’t you GET IT?” The outburst was a surprise to Taako more than anyone, and he was immediately struck by the hypocrisy of demanding that Merle understand the very thing that he hoped he would never have to. And yet the berating continued, “I am trying to PROTECT you, you know what happens to people around me I told you about-”

“Taako that wasn’t your fault, Sazed-”

“IT WAS!” Taako shrieked, his voice so high-pitched that the room seemed to scream back an echo in protest.

Taako skulked away from the door with a belated sense of worry at who could hear them in the corridor. Merle took this movement as an attempt to escape and placed himself in front of Taako once again, looking considerably less furious. 

“I may not have been the one to put arsenic in the chicken. B-but make no mistake my dude,  _ I  _ poisoned those people. My pride, my selfishness, my carelessness, my… Taako-ness… is the reason they’re dead. I pushed my best friend so far away that he… wanted me gone”

Appearing much like he’d taken a blow to the stomach, Merle’s expression was pained, and then irate, attempting to inject some humour into his words. “Excuse me? That’s  _ former  _ best friend, since that lowlife maggot isn’t close to deserving that title, especially considering the stellar candidates you have now. The only thing you might have been guilty of, and I mean  _ might  _ have been guilty of, is making a slightly crappy decision about Sazed’s part in the show”

Though they'd had this conversation before, it had never been this rational, always with less words and at a higher volume. As such, Taako was struggling to articulate the particulars of his internal turmoil. “Yeah, alright. The only thing. The  _ only  _ thing. Yeah, no big dude, it's just a few major flaws in my character that caused the deaths of 40 people”

“GOD Taako, would you give it a rest? It's not like the rest of us haven't made life ruining mistakes. And do you think a bit of a tiff between you and your buddy, sorry,  _ ex- _ buddy, warrants him trying to off you and ruin your reputation?” 

As he made his way through his rant, Merle became visibly more agitated, his excess tension showing in his heavy breathing and pacing bordering on frantic. The overall effect gave the impression of a bull in a small pen and Taako couldn't help but retreat to the sofa and fold his arms over his chest.

Once the red mist had faded a little, Merle joined Taako on the sofa, placing himself at the opposite end and staying silent until he regained his composure.

Any other time his soft tone and sappy words would have disgusted or embarrassed Taako, but today… he could feel his heart breaking. “What about all the times you've almost died because I forgot to heal you? Or all the times Magnus has acted like a dummy and rushed into a situation where we were almost totally boned? You've never held a grudge for that? Hell, we've had a hundred and one arguments since we got back from refuge and I'm still standing! And so are you Taako”

As if summoned by the tales of his stupidity Magnus emerged from his room and adopted a stance that was somehow both imposing and child-like, “Friends forgive, friends don't fuck each other over. Sazed wasn't your friend”

Merle nodded at the two of them, “I know that what we say isn't going to immediately fix how you're feeling. I said that I'm not one for regrets, and I stand by that, but I know what guilt feels like. I have made some… poor choices and some BIG mistakes. The only reason the chalice decided to show me about my dumb arm rather than my bigger failures is because… I've learnt not to regret my choices. They’re the reason I’m here right now with you guys. But that doesn't mean I don't feel the weight of what I've done. Now maybe, and it's a big fucking maybe, there's guilt to be felt about the way you treated Sazed. But you need to get over it for your own sake, nothing you do to yourself now will change history”

Magnus had wandered closer and was now gripping the back of a chair, “That  _ douchebag  _ has made you suffer every day, and feel like you deserve it, for  _ years  _ because of something he did. You gotta let it go man, or you'll never be free from it. Mourning is one thing, but this is self-flagellation”

“Look, I know you don't buy into the whole gods and fates shtick, but it makes sense that without all your decisions up until now, we wouldn't be where we are.” Merle added.

“And yeah maybe it's not as  _ cool  _ as being a star, sex symbol and chef extraordinaire… but you're saving the goddamn world. Well, you're helping  _ me _ save it anyway” Magnus perched on the arm of the sofa closest to Taako and plucked his hat away so he could ruffle his hair.

“You forgot ‘totally awesome flip-wizard” Taako snatched his hat back and straightened it absentmindedly, unable to keep a small smile away. “Well boys, if I were some sort of drippy loser, now would be about the time I say that you’re not half bad either” he cleared his throat, “and… thank you for, you know, helping me or whatever”

Luckily, any plans Magnus and Merle may have had to respond with something revoltingly affectionate were interrupted by a small comet known as Angus McDonald shooting across the room and throwing himself at Taako.

“Hey kid, watch the merchandise!” Taako chuckled, moving his hat out of harm’s way but placing it on the table in favour of holding the boy who had now snaked his arms around his torso and was practically in his lap.

After a few minutes of awkwardly stroking Angus’s head and rolling his eyes at the fond and amused looks from Merle and Magnus. Taako pried Angus away to look at him. He immediately tried to disguise his sniffles.

“What do ya say Ango McDango? Reckon we should go for some grub?”

When Angus slowly broke out a toothy grin and threw his arms around Taako’s neck, he was suddenly struck with the urge to make sure nothing hurt this boy ever again. Except maybe tripping him up now and again, didn’t want him getting too comfortable.

“Steady on little man! Didn’t realise you were such a fan of shitty casserole!”

“W-well actually sir, Mr. Magnus said he would make dinner tonight so we could um, relax with just us!” he was actually beaming at the prospect.

“Huh, I guess the menu’s been changed to  _ really  _ shitty casserole then!”

\-----------

He couldn’t blame The Director for wanted to make sure he was sufficiently recovered before sending them after the next grand relic, but after her description all those weeks ago of the trial that was to come, the elapsed time only made him more nervous.

He couldn’t quite believe that he was now standing in the bureau’s hanger about to undergo the most difficult endeavor he was ever likely to face. And he couldn’t believe that he was kind of excited about it. It was a good sign, that The Director thought he was strong enough, that his friends thought he was strong enough.

After spacing out for a bit, he realised that he’d been accidentally staring at Johann who had now noticed and was making his way over. He waved a reserved greeting and then pushed his hands back in his pockets.

“Hey, so uh, feeling a bit better then?”

“Pretty good actually, how’re things kickin’ with you?”

Johann subconsciously glances over to where Avi is cracking up as he pretends to take Angus’s nose and the corners of his mouth twitch up, “Yeah, yeah I’m not so bad either”

Taako stays silent until Johann draws his gaze away from the endearing scene to look back at him, and then puts a hand on his hip and leans on his umbra staff, “Mmm hmm”

Johann blanches and flushes in the space of a few seconds, “W-what?”

“Hmm… what was it you said to me a few weeks ago? Honesty is the best policy?” Taako asked in mock innocence, making sure to point at Avi with his eyes and smirk before sauntering over to say goodbye to Angus.

The boy saw him coming and met him halfway to hug him around the waist and nestle his head into Taako’s blouse.

“I’ll be, I’ll be helping you through the stones of farspeech. Just be careful please” he whispered.

“Aren’t we always?”

Angus pulled back to give his best admonishing stare. The kid must have been taking lessons from Lucretia.

Taako couldn’t help but laugh and twirled one of Angus’s curls around his finger, “We’ll be back before you know it bubbeleh”

“Are you scared?”

The question caught him so off guard he was shocked into answering honestly, “Well yeah, a little bit, yeah”

Angus pushed his glasses up onto his nose and tilted his head to the side, considering this response, “Good” he replied thoughtfully.

“See you soon pumpkin”

“Promise?”

“Promise”

 

**Author's Note:**

> My tumblr is captainandersmith  
> Constructive criticism is always welcome!
> 
> sorry if the formatting is weird I tried to sort it but it wasn't working the way I wanted it to


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